Smoter-in-Chief

Obama smote Mitt.  For example, he won the navel war:


 A vote for Romney is a vote for a very shaky character as Commander-in-Chief.  That's the take home message of tonight's debate.

The rest is just spin.

Mitty Mitt Mitt

Ah, Mitt. Seems you may have removed Newt Gingrich's rationale for the GOP Presidential nomination tonight -- Newt is not the greatest debater since Lincoln-Douglas after all.

As for your own rationale, that somehow you have the phenomenal business acumen that will make you a better President than Barack Obama...not so much:

• You claim you have not even seen the campaign ad with your own voice saying you approved it. Not exactly stellar detail-oriented CEO work -- it's impossible to imagine Steve Jobs, for instance, making that same mistake. Might even be a campaign finance law violation.

• You finally release your taxes after claiming your campaign's personal finance disclosure form was enough...and it turns out you lied left accounts off of that form.

How bad is it?

A review by the Los Angeles Times/Tribune Washington Bureau found that at least 23 funds and partnerships listed in the couple's 2010 tax returns did not show up or were not listed in the same fashion on Romney's most recent financial disclosure, including 11 based in low-tax foreign countries such as Bermuda, the Cayman Islands and Luxembourg.

The campaign has stressed that Romney has paid all required U.S. taxes on his foreign funds.

Many of the funds are affiliated with Bain Capital, the Boston-based private equity firm Romney ran for 15 years. Several others are apparently unrelated offshore entities with mysterious names such as Babson 2006-1, which is based in the Cayman Islands, and Barracuda Investments, which has an address in Dublin, Ireland, but appears to be solely owned by Golden Gate Capital, a private equity firm based in San Francisco.

Again, is (a) lack of attention to major (not minor) details ill-becoming of a CEO and downright dangerous in a President, (b) an attempt to obfuscate for some yet-to-be-uncovered reason, meaning we'd have an untrustworthy President or, worse, (c) you're some kind of crook, and one who would immediately under investigation upon taking office.

So what's the great rationale for a Mitt Romney candidacy now, other than generic Republican Obama hate?

Anyone?

Meow

Looks like some GOoPers can't take the heat...of exposing their ideas in public. First, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor bagged out on a speech about "income inequality" because of admission was not restricted, and now Texas Governor Rick Perry may skip some of the admittedly endless Republican Presidential debates because...he sucks at it.

Mmm, "manly" Republicans...maybe want a little bowl of milk with your Meow Mix?

Send in the Clowns

It's Mitt's to lose. Rick is shrinking next to him, the size difference, better hair (for the first time, Rick looks like he's wearing a toup), Herman Cain is entertaining and running for Secretary of Commerce, Michelle Bachmann is disappearing, Newt and Rick are hanging in by dint of experienced stubbornness, Ron Paul will always have a seat at the Primary table, who knows what speaking spot the Party Elders give him at the Convention.

The idea of Obama running against Mitt Romney for ten months is hilarious when you think about it. Presidential elections are, in large part, for who you want to see on TV for four years. The lead role in the biggest serial of all. I'll be shocked if Mitt doesn't wear out his welcome by May.

He holds his own here, but oh that smiling scold:

Astonishing how little John Huntsman has mattered. It's not that he's too left, it's that he was spectral, a ghost of a candidate, does not bode well for 2016 for him. He even disappeared tonight altogether, not at the debate. Goodbye.

Watch Perry flop so quickly, even with $17 million in his Q3 haul, is more gratifying than I ever expected. Lots of hat.

The Incredible Shrinking Rick Perry

Not only has he been displaced as a leading candidate for the GOP Presidential nomination by Herman Cain, he's getting less than lackluster reviews for his debate performance and has topped it off post-debate by forgetting in which century we had our Revolutionary War.

Off by two.

Real Patriot vs. No Leadership

Gotta love this enlightened Silicon Valley millionaire:

Doing Obama's job for him.

Meanwhile, the DNC releases the greatest hits of the recent GOP debates. I'm not very happy about the ominous music -- it's out of a Rick Perry ad -- but the three points ring true:

Evidently the President was particularly pissed about the booing of an American soldier, as well he should be. The core issue: Leadership. Not one of those Republican candidates dares to stand up to their rabble.

Here's to hoping Obama keeps his tough tone going throughout the election. In the old days it was called "staunch."

Keep it up and see what happens next November.

More from the Death Eaters

It's like the evil characters in Harry Potter that work for Valdomort: they cheer death:

This was the CNN/Tea Party Debate. I guess I shouldn't be surprised that the teabaggers are the most bloodthirsty Republicans of all (is that possible?) but they do worship their own self-righteous anger.

A vote for a Republican is a vote to dismantle the Federal government's ability to help we the people. The only winners will be the mega corps, the mega churches and mega defense. It's a vote for more and earlier death for our aged and infirm, our sickened no matter how suddenly, our children through the environment and educational neglect.

And CNN decides to partner up with this staunch political group. The John Birch Society, mainstreamed by our media.

Death Party

The don't trust the government system to help them get the best possible health insurance, but they trust the system to kill 234 people:

They are the death party -- death & taxes, as it were, or maybe better said, death = taxes. They are the party that demonizes the poor and struggling classes for being poor and working class, with a sheen to religious capitalism in service to the corporate overlords.

Better said by E.D. Kain:

It was enough to remind me that the Republican Party boils down to three things: tax cuts, “What Would Reagan Do?” and violence. For every problem there is a tax cut that will fix it. For every dodged question, the ghost of Reagan looms like a smiling, beneficent prophet. All you need to do is rub his tummy and Republican boilerplate comes dribbling out to fill in whatever gaping crevice is left unfilled by any actual ideas. And when Perry is asked about the two-hundred and thirty some people he’s executed on death row during his governorship, the audience bursts into applause. Torture, war, and death, and this is the “pro-life” party.

I submit to you that this moment is perhaps the most telling since George W. Bush left office; that the modern Republican party is not only intellectually bankrupt, but morally bankrupt as well. The conservative movement and the Fox News and talk radio media empire it has built up around itself is not only ethically decrepit but morally atrophid. As Andrew Sullivan noted, “any crowd that instantly cheers the execution of 234 individuals is a crowd I want to flee, not join. This is the crowd that believes in torture and executions.”

Everything Rick Perry says in the above clip is gainsaid by the state murder of Cameron Todd Willingham. Yes, the baddest of the bad guys need to be punished the worst, but you can't solve the injustice of an execution by releasing a prisoner. If the system is flawed, as all human systems must be, it's not cool to cheer it for its slaughter.

A non-bloodlust Republican Party might sit in reverent silence or even stirred a noticeable murmur in respect of human life they seem so hellbent on protecting prior to viability. But cheering? As at a pep rally?

The evil party.

Iowa Crazy

Another GOP Presidential debate, on the eve of the non-binding Iowa Straw Poll (it's not even the Caucus) and the entry of Texas hard-right religious conservative Republican Rick Perry into the nomination race.

This group - Romney, Bachmann, Pawlety, Gingrich, Paul, Santorum, Cain and (premiere debate appearance by) Huntsman - are so out in right field that the non-Fox cable news networks are all just outright calling them crazy. The only thing that holds that party together, all the different constituencies, is Grover Norquist, quite and accomplishment. No new taxes, less taxes, no taxes. One way ticket. To hell. Even when offered the hypothetical of 10:1 cuts:taxes increases, by a show of hands not a one of them, not even someone supposedly "moderate" like John Huntsman, would take the deal. Because the Republican Party completely is i-n-s-a-n-e:



Dangerous people. It's time to state as a fact that the Republican Party as it now stands is hellbent on destroying what's left of the social fabric of America through their very staunchness on social issues and, more importantly, taxes. They are fine with letting the wealthy get it all. And, historically, it is when the selfishness of elites hits critical mass that great states spiral into decline. It doesn't have to be that way...but it is.

This crew is so crazy that the Democrats sent out a mass email tonight telling everyone to watch the debate. It's that terrifying. Not a single one would raise a penny of taxes on or cut tax breaks for the rich. Even though America wants Congress to tax the rich.

In the sane world, Obama has pivoted to jobs, and is asking the nation to call their Congressional Representative to do so as well.

Pink Elephants

If arch-Conservative and Tea Party opportunist Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) is somehow the winner of last night's Republican Presidential debate in New Hampshire, that's kind of all you need to know.

The debate was filled with lies and ideology masquerading as "fact" most heinously about our very tame and considered healthcare reform legislation (and I promise to take a positive look at the first GOoPer candidate who calls it by its proper name, the Affordable Care Act, and eschews the manufactured misnomer, "Obamacare"), and just plain surreal candidates positions for 2011:



You want to know what's really going on that these clowns aren't addressing with any real programs, new thinking, anything other than platitudes and service to the wealthy:



Are any of these GOoPers serious about anything other than their own lust for money or power? Because they are not acting like they want to advance civilization, they want to firmly ensconce it in corporate feudalism, enforced with a layer of religious legislation.

And don't talk to me about Romney. He brings up jobs to bash Obama but admits he has no ideas or programs in mind of his own. He's just the CEO with the privatization mantra, that worked so well under Bush. Hey, he'll do Bush and Brownie one better.

Dude's ready to privatize FEMA.

Go, Russ, Go

Former Senator Russ Feingold (R-WI) may have lost his re-election bid last year, but he'd win next year, and he was fired up today at "Walkerville," the poverty encampment set up by the Wisconsin State Capitol in Madison to protest Republican Gov. Scott Walker's draconian cuts, public union disenfranchisement and privatization legislation:



Meanwhile, the GOP Presidential contenders hold their second debate -- the first one attended by frontrunner Mitt Romney -- in New Hampshire tonight. Sure to be filled with more of what Feingold rails against -- the removal of protections for Middle and Working Class Americans to better serve their corporate feudal overlords.

Like I've said before, I'll take a second look at any Republican candidate who wakes up and says we should return top end tax rates to where they were under Clinton.

If you agree that the rich should pay their fair share again, click here.

GoOfy P!

Christine O'Donnell is Alicia Silverstone in Clueless:



She also claimed in the same debate that we didn't "finish the job" when we fought the Russians in Afghanistan (hey wha? Maybe if she means funding the Mujahideen and empowering Bin Laden, then sorta) but you get the sense she might be confused with finishing the job in Iraq. Or something.

Another wacky GOP Senate nominee, John Raese in Virginia, has pegged the number of space lasers we need to defend America at 1,000. I don't know about you, but I prefer one thousand death lasers to be aimed away from me.

And poor wackbagger Carl Paladino, running for NYS Governor, can't catch a break. Yesterday he apologized for some of (and certainly not all) of his anti-gay speech to the ultra-orthodox Jewish group in Brooklyn, so today the Rabbi of that group, Yehuda Levin, withdrew his endorsement:

The rabbi, Yehuda Levin, who helped write those remarks, said Mr. Paladino “folded like a cheap camera” because of the uproar they had set off. And the rabbi said he could no longer support Mr. Paladino’s candidacy for governor of New York.

“Which part of the speech that you gave in Brooklyn to the Orthodox Jewish community are you apologizing for?” Rabbi Levin asked at a news conference in front of St. Patrick’s Cathedral, on Fifth Avenue. “Will we see you next year with your daughter at that gay pride march?”

Well, that would be a happy outcome. But the Rabbi showed how small his world really is:

Rabbi Levin said Wednesday that Mr. Paladino probably did not write his apology either. He suggested that “militant gays” wrote it and handed it to a naïve Mr. Paladino.

Because that's what they do, right, Rebbe?

Mean-ingless

Did anyone watch this final debate? I guess I'll find out when the ratings are released. I almost didn't and I have TiVo. I'm not getting the customary flurry of emails and voicemails tonight. Nobody cares like they did on the first three (including Joe Biden's trip to the Sarah Palin freakshow). But I've got it on now.

Why does McCain (like Palin) come in and write down a bunch of notes as soon as he arrives? Makes him seem disengaged when Bob welcomes them. Gotta hit this, gotta make sure to hit that. Real spontaneous.

What's the deal with McCain's eyebrows? They required more grooming. They are distracting me from what begins as his most sober opening so far. I take issue with his "our beloved Nancy Reagan" although I think it appropriate to note her accident and send best wishes, as an ex-First Lady. But he's looking strangely like an amped up version of Bob Novak, and when asked if he has a question for Sen. Obama after Barack's first answer, on the economy, he says, "Uh, no," and launches into something while Barack kinda laughs like, "That's John." Yet another one of his twists on "angry."

Is McCain on some kind of uppers? He whirlpools into "Joe the Plumber" and the CNN audience meter flatlines for a longer stretch than I remember even from the last debate. I swear, he's taking some sort of age or cancer or pain-related drug, or maybe something like the Dr. Feelgood shot Don Draper turned down on Mad Men this week. I mean, this is the clip of the debate, and he doesn't even say anything:



McCain saying "Okay? Okay?" like he's Edward G. Robinson in Little Caesar. Here, too:



And even better:



Barring catastrophe, it's over. This debate can be studied as a McCain freakout under a microscope, and it's his best performance yet.

He just scares the shit out of everybody now. He didn't in the primaries, even with the revealing "Bomb-bomb-bomb Iran" type jokes, but when he picked Sarah Palin he revealed his true character, and it's one unsuited to the Office of U.S. President. McCain may have grown up thinking he was cool because he was a poor-little-rich-military kid rebel, but self-centered the same way that George W. Bush was and is, maybe not to the same degree.

The last undecideds who can be persuaded are overwhelmingly falling to Barack Obama. It's brutal:

CBS poll of undecided voters:

Who won the debate?

McCain (R) 22
Obama (D) 53

Shares your values

Obama, Before the debate: 54
Obama, After the debate: 63

McCain, Before the debate: 53
McCain, After the debate: 56

Update: CNN poll of voters who watched debate:

Who won the debate?

McCain (R) 31
Obama (D) 58

Favorable/Unfavorable

Obama, before debate: 63/35
Obama, after debate: 66/33

McCain, before debate: 51/45
McCain, after debate: 49/49

McCain is actually less popular now than he was at 9:00pm ET. His favorables have sunk to exact parity with his unfavorables. While Obama grew to am all-time high favorable score exactly double that of his unfavorable.

Is it possible that McCain only gets, like, @ 57 electoral votes (to an Obama 481), i.e. eleven states and not Texas?

Is it?

Bonus Post: Debate Prediction

Here you go -- if I'm wrong, there's always post deletion:

I don't really care what McCain does tonight, except in that scientific interest sort of way. Or maybe circus sideshow/auto accident way. And maybe he'll acquit himself well, but I'd be surprised if there's a gamechanger here, as even playing nice will be seen as more evidence of erraticism now.

I'm much more interested in the Obama strategy and execution. My guess is that he'll skillfully "close the deal" by closing the loop. And I predict he will do that by tying together the recent themes that have grown tall in his campaign -- economic rescue via jobs, shared responsibility and revived American spirit -- with his 2004 Democratic National Convention keynote speech, the one that catapaulted him to the national stage, "The Audacity of Hope" speech, albeit tempered with the stark realities of this moment.

Back then a friend (who actually ended up a Hillary supporter) told me it was the most impressive convention speech she had ever seen, and to watch this guy as a potential Presidential candidate. I thought it was a pretty rousing speech, but my thoughts ended there. Whoops.

However, I believe we will hear a reprise in Obama's unity message tonight, which had this key passage:

The pundits, the pundits like to slice-and-dice our country into Red States and Blue States; Red States for Republicans, Blue States for Democrats. But I’ve got news for them, too. We worship an "awesome God" in the Blue States, and we don’t like federal agents poking around in our libraries in the Red States. We coach Little League in the Blue States and yes, we’ve got some gay friends in the Red States. There are patriots who opposed the war in Iraq and there are patriots who supported the war in Iraq. We are one people, all of us pledging allegiance to the stars and stripes, all of us defending the United States of America.

Listen for echoes of this. If he does do such a callback (in comedian parlance) it will be an epic four-year callback, with the same storytelling power of the climax to a brilliantly written movie, as well as proving he's the candidate with the most cohesive and compelling vision in years.

If I'm wrong, I'm voting for McCain.

Just kidding!!

Mc39%

O.k., maybe it isn't yet time to stop McNaming John. Kind of like McDonalds. Does that make Sarah Palin the Hamburgler?

While the 4+/- margin of error may make this CBS/NY Times poll more like Obama 49% and McCain 41%, but the fact that the morning of the final Presidential debate has the candidates at 53%-39% must be troubling for the McCain camp. It's a threshold you don't want to cross, even in an outlier. It's something you don't want bolstered with most post-debate polls. Crossing below the 40% mark, that's Bush Country.

But what if the dam really is bursting.

While the 100% negative as spend this past week polls as one reason for the drop in McCain support, clearly the biggest political mistake of this political cycle was his selection of running mate. Sarah Palin has single-handedly flipped Florida for Obama. She scares old people, especially elderly Jews.

Per Adam Nagourney, Obama eased voter doubt past the tipping point in the two debates. McCain isn't going to beat him by being nice or feisty or aggressive tonight. The die is cast. Even if he comes in jovial it'll read as erratic.

But we're also seeing the beginning of the organizational tsunami. Obama has an amazing early voting effort, which has him ahead in the pre-election day vote in New Mexico by 23 points and in Ohio by 18 points -- votes already cast.

My own experience: I volunteered for phone banking yesterday at the well-situated Democratic HQ here on Wilshire and 9th in Santa Monica. So well-organized, with some key people (mainly young women) making things work, while volunteers of all ages put in time.

The 13-year-old girl next to me got called a "dumbass" on one call, and I got one 80-year-old McCain supporter but he was respectful, and a few enthused Obama supporters. One guy told me he's voting for Obama because "McCain's too old and Palin's a dipshit!" Right on.

Mostly it was marking down "NH" for not home, but they have these call sheets with UPC's for each of the 18 targets on the list, along with age and registration. When you finish the sheets they go right to the data entry team. I used a landline, but there was one guy just trafficking cellphones (leave your driver's license) and swapping batteries. The core focus of these calls to Nevada is early voting, I'm assuming for the next few weeks. I'm guessing there's a horizon (maybe not this election) where a campaign wins before Election Day even begins. I'm betting the momentum of cast votes will almost always help whoever is ahead -- winners are magnetic, not so much perceived losers.

I got one mom on the phone who was happy to get the early voting info for her and her husband -- that's a phone number that reaches the Nevada campaign to tell you early voting places and even provides a ride(!) -- as well as absentee ballot info for her son in college back in Boston. The old (like, 78) woman next to me (and her 80+ year-old husband) was hilarious. She was a Hillary supporter who thought she'd vote Obama but not volunteer -- she and her husband both phonebanked for Kerry and were unhappy with the result -- until Sarah Palin came along! She started going to websites debunking the anti-Obama emails her friends were sending her and has grown to really like the guy.

At the other end of the age spectrum, the organizers told me that one of their very best callers is just 10-years-old.

There's a buzz going on coast-to-coast now, and Zack Exley lays it all out on HuffPo:

The "New Organizers" have succeeded in building what many netroots-oriented campaigners have been dreaming about for a decade. Other recent attempts have failed because they were either so "top-down" and/or poorly-managed that they choked volunteer leadership and enthusiasm; or because they were so dogmatically fixated on pure peer-to-peer or "bottom-up" organizing that they rejected basic management, accountability and planning. The architects and builders of the Obama field campaign, on the other hand, have undogmatically mixed timeless traditions and discipline of good organizing with new technologies of decentralization and self-organization.

Win or lose, "The New Organizers" have already transformed thousands of communities—and revolutionized the way organizing itself will be understood and practiced for at least the next generation...This article focuses on the field program's innovative "neighborhood team" structure and the philosophy of volunteer management underlying it that is best summarized by the field campaign's ubiquitous motto: "Respect. Empower. Include."

I expect the Obama 2008 Campaign, from the first strategic plan Barack presented to Michelle in order to get her approval to run two years ago through the groundbreaking GOTV effort on Election Day, will be taught not only in political science classes but also business schools for the next 25-50 years.

And I recommend participating -- less than three weeks left to volunteer to be a part of making history.

Tipping Point

Peter Suderman says it best:

Obama, as always, appeared sophisticated, urbane: He held the mic in that delicate, refined way of final-level American Idol contestants, and constantly seemed to be holding an imaginary pen in the air and trying to visualize it. He will solve America’s energy crisis with telekinesis.

McCain, on the other hand, came off as less the high-toned maverick and more the self-satisfied frat-boy goof: He started several of his answers with an Igor-via-Beavis-and-Butthead chuckle: heh-heh, heh-heh. Sorry dude, not funny.

One thing that’s clear from this debate is how little there is to John McCain and his campaign. He’s running on a few, vague issues – tax cuts, an aggressive response to Russia in specific and terrorism in general, something about energy – and a whole lot of non-policy fluff: America’s inherent strength and goodness, Obama’s inexperience, scorn for Washington insiders. But mostly, he’s running on a platform anchored by a single assumption: that John McCain is inherently, singularly qualified to lead the country, and, subsequently, deserving of the office of president. McCain views the White House as something to which he is unequivocally entitled. Beyond that, nothing else matters. Indeed, if you hold this view, nothing else would.

That's it, what tonight sealed in the public's mind: McCain has no vision, no platform, no meaningful policies. McCain's I - I - I vs. Obama's we - you - us. And this isn't a lesser of two evils election: Obama has a vision and he is ready to lead.

The debate reaction numbers are ruthless. The pundits are relaxed about it now, not trying to fake equivalency, everyone (I believe) relieved that, barring any real or tragic gamechangers, we'll have someone with a real shot at saving this country in the White House in 3 1/2 months. Help will be on the way.

The McCain surrogates couldn't even spin it convincingly tonight. Some of the second string is out, one young guy who's getting his late-game field training but only saying that he thinks McCain won the debate on "substance." One wonders, is he using "substance" as a euphemism for "nothing?" Is he using "win" as a euphemism for "lost the election tonight?"

Because this is the tipping point. With McCain flatlining on the crazy CNN reacto-meter and Obama pinning the needle with women a number of times, I'm expecting to see more movement towards Obama in the polls this week.

The moment where I think Obama won the debate:



Clearly he was ready for McCain to repeat the claim that Obama "doesn't understand" but Barack delivered his response line that there's a lot he doesn't understand without sounding rehearsed. McCain walked right into the trap. Obama led, huge surprise, on the national security debate, with a little bump for McCain on Russia.

Also, McCain will be considered a wuss by hard-right Palin-loving Conservatives for not smearing Obama with the bullshit "friend of terrorist" charge. But clearly the reason he didn't is because the always strategic and prepared Obama campaign made clear this past weekend with their rapid response that if McCain brought up Ayer, he could expect a Keating rain, and spend the next five minutes trying to defend himself from that documented association.

I could go on about McCain bringing up ancient history like Ronald Reagan, calling for government to change a bunch of mortgages (anathema to Conservatives), his crazy overuse of "my friends" to the point where it's most of my 8-year-old's imitation of him, his odd jokes to himself or Tom Brokaw, the dissonant reliance on Joe Lieberman's name, the height and physicality advantage of his opponent. But the main substance of his loss is, indeed, his lack of substance.

And McCain's worst moment, if only because it's the most easily and, I expect, frequently replayable:



Fair or not, that'll be the takeaway moment from this debate. No one will watch the final debate, except maybe if you like watching accidents. Maybe it'll be McCain's final moment of surprising grace. Maybe he'll know by then that he's lost and accept it and be a good soldier for the good of the country.

We'll see.

As for his running mate, maybe she can outrun her Troopergate, get reelected or get a TV show or Ted Stevens' Senate seat and come back in 2012 to battle Mitt and whomever for the GOP Presidential nomination.

But I like this answer better.

Joe Biden

While Sarah Palin did well enough to stay on the ticket, she didn't do a damned thing to advance the "Obama is too dangerous to be President" narrative for the McCain campaign, focused much more on damage control for her own career and, as Paul Begala rightly pointed out, 2012. If McCain continues to sink in the polls, look for her to move away from him emotionally (even further) in the final week or two. He needs her now more than she needs him, especially to get big crowds and especially after tonight, and since the only ideology she truly seems committed to is her own ambition I'm imagining the repellent nature of the loser stench will extend from downticket Republicans to Palin herself by November 4th, unless he pulls within 5 points and 20 Electoral College votes of Obama again, seriously.

On the other hand, Joe Biden successfully advanced the narrative tying John McCain to George W. Bush as more of the same. He was particularly brilliant in taking apart the maverick meme, finding a perfect opening after Palin relied on calling herself and McCain their own nickname a third time too many. (Who gives themselves nicknames or even touts them in the real world without looking like a fool?) He knowledgeably took apart that meme, so now the more McCain says it, the more we'll remember Joe proving that McCain has never been a maverick where it really counted in people's lives.

The other phrase for such a non-helpful maverick is, of course, juvenile delinquent.

Biden also took apart Dick Cheney, wailed on McCain as wrong on the war etc. in perfect echo of Obama's strongest moment last Friday night, offered real rather than index card, off-question answers, and had the perfect demeanor vs. the over-wired, winking and jiving Ms. Palin. While she was a little less snarky than in the past, a little less McNasty, she nonetheless blew not only the name of a general (hearkening back to the Civil War), but she blew the biggest moment of the debate, when Joe Biden revealed his humanity and she could only respond with another rehearsed, off-moment talking point:



But the real campaign news of the day is that McCain is pulling up stakes in Michigan. He's on the run now, trying to hold the states George Bush won in 2004. While there could still be a mini-swing or two back to McCain before the election, this does mean he's making hard choices on where to put diminishing resources, which also means Obama can get aggressive more places, maybe lead McCain to have to defend, say, North Carolina more aggressively. This also means McCain will go untethered now -- expect to see vicious smears both above and below the radar of the most dishonest or immoral kind.

Maybe there's a moment when McCain realizes he can't win the election, or when some GOP honchos make that realization and put a bridle on him for the good of the country or just to start rebuilding the reputation of the Party. As Biden said in the debate, McCain is offering no coherent, realistic plans for anything, so what does he have to run on but negative campaigning?

But I think guys like McCain go down the hardest. And for Republicans, when all else fails, there's still this angle to fall back on:



As they say in Chicago: Vote early, vote often.

McOver

I desperately want to write about Paul Newman because he was the coolest movie star when I was a kid and maybe until today, but I hope to do so soon when I have my thoughts collected. But have to note his sad passing -- a great life, but one of the guys you always want around, and it sucks a little more to live in a world without him.

But, Presidential politics junkie that I've been ever since 1968 when my buddy from next door and I argued Humphrey vs. Nixon at the morning bus stop, I can't help but note the watershed it appears (and I believe will be proven on Election Day) happened last night, when John McCain was forced to be on a stage with Barack Obama and, in McCain's own terms for why he never wants to meet with an enemy like Iran, de facto legitimized him.

To put a scalpel to it, McCain created the opening for Obama to legitimize himself to maybe 30 million Americans who may have seen him rarely or never before and had all those lingering preconceptions about him being weightless, elitist, implicitly dangerous. Because if Obama hadn't performed as cleanly as he did, addressing the needs of the American Middle Class while seeming toe-to-toe knowledgeable about foreign affairs, it wouldn't have worked. If he had landed the so-called "knockout blow" to McCain, he would have been seen as an aggressor, opening the "angry black man" meme again.

Instead, when he landed a blow, it was a counterpunch -- most effectively in the bracelet exchange. And, as the theme of this debate was who does or doesn't understand the difference between strategy and tactics, Obama's strategy was fine, mainly because by attacking Obama with lies and aggressive condescension, McCain provided Barack with a target rich environment where he could effective use a scalpel, not a hatchet.

What makes this debate so much more of an epic showdown than most folks I've read or spoken with is that this was quite possibly the most extraordinary weeks you'll ever witness in Presidential politics. You had the collapse of the American investment banking system providing both backdrop and catalyst for the crumbling of the McCain Presidential campaign. Read Frank Rich for a tremendously valuable and searingly entertaining documentation of this past Wednesday, September 24th, the first act in a three-day drama that climaxed Friday night.

Essentially what happened is that the disastrous backstory choice of Sarah Palin as his running mate, once the initial flush of gambler's high dissipated into negative approval ratings of the Alaska Governor, has congealed into a failed product, her inability to appear on national television in front of any but the most in-the-bag journalist (Hannity) without bleeding credibility like a hemophiliac in a knife fight.

This hits McCain like a ton of bricks so he goes all in. (This poker metaphor will work even better by Sunday night, as The New York Times article on McCain's gambling and relationship to the Indian and Vegas casinos gets finished being read.) He uses the bailout crisis as a way to grab the headlines away from her (Katie Couric interview) and, it appears, to pretend to suspend his campaign as a tactic to get the first debate suspended, with the dice roller's hope that he'll be able to get the VP debate scuttled and get her elected Vice President without once having to appear again outside of Dominionist fundraisers.

He goes to D.C. and -- this is the most interesting part of the Second Act -- gets humiliated by Obama (and his own lack of preparation) in front of the President, the leaders of the House and Senate, the House Republicans -- everyone in the conference room at the White House. He's supposed to stay for a photo op, but he leaves without speaking to anybody.

So on Friday night the ninety-minute climax turns on McCain's unwillingness to acknowledge his competitor, because he only thinks of him as a challenger and has been shamed by this challenger once this week already. In front of the biggest student council meeting of them all.

A reader identified as a "researcher on social cognition and behavior in primates" sent Josh Marshall the most telling analysis:

I think people really are missing the point about McCain's failure to look at Obama. McCain was afraid of Obama. It was really clear--look at how much McCain blinked in the first half hour. I study monkey behavior--low ranking monkeys don't look at high ranking monkeys. In a physical, instinctive sense, Obama owned McCain tonight and I think the instant polling reflects that.

Pwned, to put it in videogamer terms.

So what next? Will Palin drop out and maybe Rudy step in? Is he the only guy with ego enough to think he would keep McCain from going down and get co-painted with loser colors? Is that why he and his wife just flew with the McCains?

Or is there going to be more tabloid-style distraction from Angry Johnny, i.e. the campaign paying godknowswhat money to Levi Johnston to force a Bristol Palin celebrity-style shotgun wedding before the election? Anything to capture as many news cycles as possible -- is that a strategy of flailing tactictry?

The polls on Monday morning will be telling, because if Obama did indeed turn the dial, adding maybe three more states as likely to vote for him, then McCain either knows he's lost and just lets it play out (which might be reflected by the GOP establishment not pressuring him to drop Palin from the ticket, just let her burn with him) or he makes another insane lurch.

I'd bet on the lurch.

Now, as to the next Obama/McCain debate, the Town Hall-style one that is again supposed to favor McCain, I'm betting you'll see Johnny forcing himself to make a lot of ungainly eye contact with Barack, maybe even use his name, maybe even seem natural or gracious for a moment. But I'm guessing it'll come across as a personality flip, which implies either inauthentic or crazy, while Obama will be the exact same person everybody met in the first debate. It'll be a bit like Al Gore too obviously shifting gears from one debate to another. And I expect Obama to pull some sort of ripcord in the final debate that calls back to some narrative he set up in the first debate.

Strategy.

The Obama campaign, to its great credit, takes nothing for granted even in apparent advance and unleashes a video ad that's strikes at the heart of the Obama supporters lead vocalized fear: what it like on November 5th we all wake up to John McCain as the President Elect?

I can't say with total certainty that Barack Obama will win this crucial election. It's often said that a week can be a lifetime in politics, and this past week surely proved it. But I am certain about one thing, that if Barack Obama wins outright on November 4th and John McCain loses, Sarah Palin and family will suddenly find themselves with a lot fewer friends when they get back home to Alaska, because all those GOP/McCain campaign operatives who are forcing her Attorney General appointee to sue to scuttle the Troopergate investigation, who are keeping a lid on her fiefdom-type acts as Governor, who are keeping Levi Johnston from getting caught with another girl in public and Todd & Sarah out of jail will suddenly evaporate into Alaska Air.

If they do lose, and the drama's finally over, will McCain ever even call her again?

McAngry

So after getting a panic call from a friend but having had to TiVo the debates due to fatherly duties, I was prepared to see Obama having wilted under McCain's aged superiority.

Instead I saw what has already become the story of the debate -- the George H.W. Bush glance at the watch, the Al Gore sigh. John McCain did not once make contact with Barack Obama during the debate.

Wow, for someone claiming bipartisan credentials, nice way to say, "Contempt."

When I was in London during college and heard then-President Jimmy Carter debating Ronald Reagan, it seemed clear that Carter had won. But the folks watching it on television knew differently. So ever since then I've been cautious about assigning win/loss based even on my own TV viewing. Al Gore won the first 2000 debate on points, but George Bush won it (and I hate to say this) on demeanor. The pundits gave it to Al Gore right after, but a day or so later, nope.

I've been saying for this past rise in the polls that while Obama may be surging, more people are looking for a reason to vote against Obama than are looking for a reason to vote against McCain. So while concerned Obama fans like my friend may fret that he didn't take any opportunity to deliver a single knockout blow, what they may be learning is that Mr. Long-Term Strategy actually did all he needed to do to keep his momentum rolling. He made everyone comfortable voting for him who might be persuaded.

Yes, you can...be President.

The proof:

According to CBS News / Knowledge Networks' poll of undecided voters:

40% of uncommitted voters who watched the debate tonight thought Barack Obama was the winner. 22% thought John McCain won. 38% saw it as a draw.

68% of these voters think Obama would make the right decision
about the economy. 41% think McCain would.

49% of these voters think Obama would make the right decisions about Iraq. 55% think McCain would.

More here, including some really beautiful pics of Michelle Obama and the look of love between the two of them. Establishment pundit, Mark Halperin giving Obama the big A- over McCain B-, with Obama scoring lowest (per my friend) on "Offense: B" and trouncing on "Style". McCain anger management dissected on TPM. And Frank Luntz with another one of his patented voter panels:

McCain needed more than a tie to win -- this is Obama's John Kennedy moment, and no one can say he doesn't get foreign policy from this point forward. But it's the lingering McContempt meme that will really continue to bleed McCain, as it shows both anger and weakness, a kind of literalization of his unwillingness to meet with foreign powers with whom we disagree.

And after a few trips off the reservation, it's nice to see Joe Biden backing up the message so forcefully:

Which begs the question, where do you think was Sarah Palin tonight?

Guess we'll see her again next Thursday. But for tonight, sleep well, Obamaholics.

McCrazy

With his numbers nosediving in polls from The Wall Street Journal to even Fox News, with news of McCain getting $5,000 make-up treatments, with Laura Bush agreeing that Sarah Palin has zero foreign policy experience, and with Palin herself tanking in an interview with Katie Couric:



...what's a hero to do? Meltdown.

From Reuters:

Republican White House hopeful John McCain threw the campaign into turmoil on Wednesday by calling for a delay in the first presidential debate to try to forge a Wall Street rescue plan -- a surprise move promptly rejected by Democrat Barack Obama

The political stunner came as some polls showed McCain falling behind Obama in their race for the November 4 election. Republicans and the White House welcomed McCain's move as a needed appeal for both parties to work together, while Democrats suspected a publicity stunt.

Y'think? Why the hell is McCain scared to be seen on the same stage as Obama -- unless he's somehow stacked the deck. And why are they trying to push off the Vice Presidential debate between Biden and, gulp, cratering Sarah Palin? Could it be...panic?

McCain's appeal is a cynical move based on a genuine economic crisis. Not the economic crisis in Washington. The financial crisis is in McCain's campaign. McCain has only $85 million to play with. Even though the RNC is skirting the fringes of election law and subsidizing McCain's ad campaign, McCain is still at a disastrous financial disadvantage. Obama plans to spend $40 million in Florida alone.

Every day McCain can shave from the remaining forty odd days left in the campaign via "suspending" his campaign makes his financial disadvantage less significant. Con the media into giving him free airtime to cover his "surprising announcement?" Good. Bully Obama into pulling ads? Even better.

The fact is that previous debates have been held while a crisis was happening and each candidate could walk and chew gum at the same time. Per Obama:

"It's my belief that this is exactly the time when the American people need to hear from the person who in approximately 40 days will be responsible for dealing with this mess," said Obama. "Part of the president's job is to deal with more than one thing at once."

And while McCain pretended he couldn't get back to Obama when Barack approached him about doing a bipartisan statement, he was actually meeting with mega-wealthy ex-Clinton supporter Lady Lynn Forester de Rothchild. You know, "Country First."

Harold Meyerson nails what's really going on here, and it is appalling:

Slipping in the polls? Concerned that Americans may be paying more attention to the declining economy -- and even supporting economic regulation again -- than to your own stellar leadership abilities?

What's a Republican presidential nominee to do?

If you're named John McCain, the answer became apparent yesterday afternoon -- make the solution to the economic crisis all about yourself. Suspend your campaign. Pull out of tomorrow's debate -- a trivial exercise merely allowing Americans to judge the two candidates side by side. Change the terms of the nation's economic discussion from the course we should take, and the defects of the laissez-faire model that got us here, to the indispensability of John McCain, leader of leaders.

Meanwhile, those doing the real work and late hours all this week to craft a deal like Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid tell McCain to stay away. Rep. Barney Frank goes further:

"All of sudden, now that we are on the verge of making a deal, John McCain here drops himself in to help us make a deal, Frank said.

He expressed fear that McCain, a U.S. senator from Arizona who has spent much of the year away from the Capitol campaigning, could end up slowing down work on the bill.

The Massachusetts Democrat noted that a meeting on Capitol Hill on Thursday will be interrupted for a "photo op" at the White House with congressional Democrats and Republicans as well as Bush.

"We're trying to rescue the economy, not the McCain campaign," Frank said.

Aside from the fact that "Ole Miss" has been preparing for this debate for ages and that cancellation by McCain would cause yet another financial crisis, losing them several million dollars, there's the psycho nature of the whole ploy, per Michael Tomasky:

Think about the kind of mind that's required to even think up something like this. I could never think up something like this. Most average people, of whatever political persuasion, could never do it. Some pundits are talking about desperation and Hail Mary passes and so on, but that doesn't really begin to describe the deviousness at work here.

This is like a man who gets caught cheating on his wife and then, with his back against the wall and with confrontation looming, goes out and intentionally wrecks the car, contriving to break a few ribs and get rushed to the hospital, all to delay the inevitable conflict and in the cynical knowledge that, in front of the doctors and until the wounds are bound, the wife will be forced to offer sympathy. Males are messed up creatures, but believe me, only a rather small percentage of us is really capable of thinking this connivingly.

I mean, which one of these two is shouting "Fire!" in a crowded theater, and which one would you trust in a Presidential crisis:





Clue: It's the one who took questions.

(And, more ominously, who's left eye isn't twitching like something medical is going wrong inside.)

But the most brutal commentator of all today was none other than David Letterman, stood up by McCain supposedly so the Senator could jet back to D.C. (where he's missed more votes this year than any other Senator) and solve the crisis, but was revealed to be in studio with Katie Couric, possibly to try and drown out the Palin interview. And it looks like Letterman is not a guy you want to stand up:



Ouch, ouch, ouch. For the whole show. Relentless. So McCain is down in the 4th Quarter and, for a multitude of reasons, calls for a time out.

Matthew Yglesias recalls what happens when you try a stunt like that.